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Brief Summary

Sporangiophores erect, simple, terminate in a sterile apex and bearing fertile branches laterally or branching apically to form fertile branches that are coiled or straight to curved. Each fertile branch system consists of a main branch that terminates in a nonexpanded or inflated apex that bears the fertile head and lateral branches that terminate in sterile spines. Fertile apex bears several 2-celled, simple or branched, sporiferous branchlets that produce two-celled merosporangia. Sporangiospores more or globose to ellipsoid, smooth-walled, remaining dry at maturity. Zygospores more or less globose, wall thick, hyaline, ornamented. Haustorial parasites of Mucorales and Ascomycetes..

Type species: D. cornuta.

Dispira currently contains four species, two that are parasites of Mucorales, D. cornuta and D. parvispora, and the other two, D. implicata and D. simplex, that are parasites of the ascomycete genus Chaetomium. All species only have been isolated from dung. Dispira simplex was not grown in culture when it was described (Benjamin 1959) but its host preference was reported two years later (Benjamin, 1961). (Zygomycetes.org 2015)